Wednesday, February 12, 2014

So, I don’t always look through my app updates when they come through. I’ll admit that to begin with. For some reason, just over a week ago, I happened to glance at the list that popped up with Facebook.

DO. YOU. READ. THEM?!

I was honestly stunned at what Facebook is looking for permission to do on our phones! This is from my phone and the pictures below are from my tablet.

Can someone explain this to me?!

1. What does Facebook need with reading our text messages? The ONLY reason I see for this is invasion of privacy. The things I put on Facebook, for the most part, I don’t mind that they see it. I have “private” conversations, that are really of no huge significance, but are simply private between the person I’m having with an myself. I understand that those conversations being on the world wide web makes them truly NOT private.

My TEXTS on the other hand? THOSE are private. Well, aside from the government and they’d truly be bored reading my texts. I see absolutely NO point of Facebook having or WANTING access to my text messages. As you can see above, the app can read ALL SMS messages regardless of content or confidentiality. Does this throw up ANY red flags?

2. Why would Facebook want to prevent my phone from sleeping. Granted, there may be some “valid” purpose that a techy person might be able to point to, but as a user, I don’t see one. They also want to be able to toggle my sync off and on? *Eye roll* Has anyone mentioned to them that they don’t ACTUALLY rule the world so much that they need to be in control of my phone syncing?

3. What would be the purpose of them doing a THING to my calendar? What business is it of THEIRS? They don’t need to see my day to day life. They want to do that, they can go check out Instagram. If I want them, Facebook, to know what time I’ll be doing something, that’s what I have a status update for On. Their. Site! Maybe they mean the calendar on their site, but that makes no sense. I’m rather positive they want to access my phone’s calendar.

To top that off, they want to be able to email guests…WITHOUT MY PERMISSION and it will APPEAR to come from me? Again, for real? Facebook needs that much control over what’s going on in everyone’s lives? Can I get a messenger boy here…”Ahem, Mimi would like to announce that Facebook is NOT God.” I just thought someone might need to put that out there for them.

Oh, and did you see, that not only can they read your calendar, they can read anything confidential in it. hahahahaha At least they’re straight forward that they’re going to snoop through your confidential business, and send your profile information to others.

4. I didn’t underline that bottom part in the first picture above, but you can see with your own eyes. lol UGH, *wry laugh* Facebook wants to modify your contacts, read my contacts and write a call log. “Write a call log”? Because…? On top of that, the app can call numbers which we could be charged for. So, Facebook decides they want to call China? They pick MY phone and make the call? Yea, far fetched, but this entire app update is far fetched!

5. So, say you’re sitting in bed at night going hanging out with your tablet and the camera on your device takes your picture…randomly…without your permission. What if you’re taking a leisurely bath scrolling through your email and “snap”. Well, this app can do that ANY time without your confirmation!

I understand apps need to have permissions to do certain things on our devices. Don’t get me wrong, but the apps should be to the USER’S benefit to interact with the company we have the app from, not to be in control of the phone. They want to be that in control of everything my phone does, they can start paying the bill.

Is anyone else rolling their eyes as much as me? I have NO clue of anything good that could come with authorizing this app. So, now every time updates come through, I have to be sure to do each one individually and read through what they want permission to do.

Whaaaaaaa???? I just did that update a couple days ago and I do read most of them but...sigh....Oh Facebook...don't make me break up with you, we have come so far...Hope its not too late to uninstall the update...meanwhile I'm trying to remember if I have been naked around my phone...

You'd be surprised how many apps for both Android or iOS have very invasive permission on your phone. Facebook is not the only one. I only have 5 or 6 apps currently with almost no invasive permissions. I did read them all and deleted about 95% of the apps on my phone for these reasons.

Hanan, thanks for the link to Facebook. The permissions vs the examples of what they use the app for don't seem to correlate well. Like having permission to send email to guests without owners’ knowledge vs This allows you to see your Facebook events in your phone’s calendar, I don't get. lol I think overall it just tweaks my sensibilities! For me, I'd rather be safe than sorry, KWIM?! =)